In supermarkets and grocery stores space for the mounting of bag dispensers is usually at a premium. It is desirable to use as much of the space available as possible for the display of produce or the handling of other groceries. However, certain facilities must be provided to the store's customers and checkout personnel for efficient produce sales and merchandise handling. One such facility is the provision of produce bags that may be conveniently used by the customers to collect the produce that they wish to purchase. Another facility is a checkout counter that has a bag dispensing rack mounted into a vertical counter surface, thereby providing unencumbered horizontal counter space for the handling of the customer's merchandise. Ideally, the store would like to provide simple to use produce and merchandise bag dispensers that are easy to maintain, hold a large quantity of bags of a sufficient size and which do not require frequent servicing.
In addition, grocery stores would like to use space for the bag dispensers not readily usable for the display of produce or other merchandise. It is most convenient to display produce and other items on angled or substantially horizontal shelves. Vertical surfaces, such as the walls of display stands and shelves are good locations to position bag dispensers as such surfaces are not readily usable for other displays. Toward this end, some supermarket chains have developed standardized plastic bins that are installed into vertical and some horizontal surfaces. These bins are designed to accommodate a horizontal rod on which a large roll of produce bags is rotatably suspended. The present invention makes use of these standardized bins to make available larger stores of produce or merchandise bags to the shopping customer and checkout personnel.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,685,075, issued to Kannankeril, discloses a pivoting arm bag dispenser and bag dispensing system. This reference discloses a dispenser for serially dispensing plastic bags from a wound roll of plastic bags mounted around a core. The dispenser is a wire frame structure with a roll restraining means comprising side rails to prevent axial movement of bags roll. The roll of bags is rolled onto a hollow plastic core with a passageway therethrough that receives the U-shaped axial portion of the pivotable arm. The arm may be moved from a roll mounting position to a bag dispensing position. A tongue or double tongue is provided to assist in bag separation. The dispenser has a support member with a plurality of mounting holes which allows dispenser to be secured to a vertical wall or mounted to a support system.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,727,721, issued to Guido et al. is directed to a flexible web dispenser of a wire frame type that provides for the mounting of a roll of plastic bags and the dispensing of individual bags from that roll. The dispenser includes an outer frame and an inner frame that pivots within the outer frame so that the plastic bag to be dispensed may be pivoted into position from a loading position allowing the webbing jaws to draw together in a clamping action so as to frictionally engage the plastic web prior to the removal of an individual bag. The wire frame structure of the dispenser restricts the lateral motion of the roll of plastic bags and thus provides for the restraining of the roll for convenience and dispensing bags from said roll.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,089,514, issued to Huang et al. discloses a swing-arm bagging rack for supporting multiple styles of packs of plastic bags. The structure of the dispenser is of the wire frame type used to dispense plastic bags from a roll or a plurality of rolls of plastic bags with a swinging arm structure. Uprights may be fixed to the arm portion and comprise a short section of rod with a slightly enlarged head.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,819,898, issued to Benoit et al. is directed to a bag holding, dispensing, loading and discharge system. A clamp member is provided on a bar along with an upwardly-extending protrusion which provides a lock-like structure.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,915,460, issued to Nook et al. is directed to a security system for dispensing racks illustrating a latching structure for a dispenser rack.
U.S. Pat. Nos. 7,591,405, 7,424,963, and 7,270,256, issued to Daniels illustrate wire frame structures for roll mounted plastic bags.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,863,125, issued to Bateman discloses a flexible dispenser for film bags.
U.S. Patent Application No. 2008/0128465, published for Wilfong is directed to a recessed dispenser for plastic bags that may provide for more than one pack of plastic bags in a single dispenser.
It is an objective of the present invention to provide a compact system for dispensing plastic produce bags or merchandise bags. It is another objective to provide such dispensers that can be mounted to an adapter that can be removably installed in standardized plastic bins provided by grocery store owners. It is still another objective to provide such a system that can store an increased number of relatively large produce or merchandise bags in the standardized bin. It is yet another objective of the invention to provide a dispenser system that provides a visual indication when the bag pack needs to be replaced. It is a further objective to provide such a system that can be easily fabricated from existing dispenser and other mechanical components. It is yet a further objective to provide a dispenser system that cannot be loaded incorrectly. Finally, it is an objective of the present invention to provide such a system that is durable, inexpensive and simple to service.
While some of the objectives of the present invention are disclosed in the prior art, none of the inventions found include all of the requirements identified.